


Give Me Shelter

by scatteredmoonlight



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, F/M, Huddling For Warmth, Hurt/Comfort, Sharing a Bed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-11
Updated: 2019-11-11
Packaged: 2020-10-14 02:28:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20593181
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scatteredmoonlight/pseuds/scatteredmoonlight
Summary: Jyn and Cassian survive Crait and find shelter in an abandoned aircraft. Only Cassian's injuries need care.





	Give Me Shelter

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Rivulet027](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rivulet027/gifts).

Cassian Andor was the most stunning man Jyn had ever known. To die alongside him was the greatest mercy life had ever given her. She held onto him tightly, memorizing the weight of him surrendered onto her as he struggled to stand.

As the flames of the fire pit ahead of them across the lake grew in power, Cassian touched her cheek and brushed aside chestnut hair. “I’m glad I met you, finally, in the end.”

The message behind his words were too heartfelt to bear, and his eyes gazing down at her with care, as if it were any lake they stood beside holding another. She wanted him to stop looking at her as if she were a doll that could crack — no one looked at her that way, not since her family, since her father died in her arms. So Jyn did the only thing she could think of to make her last moments alive easier. She kissed him.

Oh, it had been so long since someone had just touched her. A spark of adrenaline raced through it. She had forgotten how wonderful it could be to hold a man in her arms, and much time had passed since she had last touched a man. His chapped lips were rough and sweet against her lips, his light gasp a welcome surprise. She had never kissed a spy nor an assassin, and yet now she kissed both at the same time, and he melted beneath her. She revelled in her power to subdue him. He paused before kissing back, his hold on her never moving as he could barely stand without holding her as he did, and she didn’t dare adjust her hold on him. She deepened the kiss with a press of her tongue, and he followed her every instinct, kissing her here, kissing her there, with a fervor that matched her own. They melted together in a gentle passion that had her stomach flipping and ears buzzing from nerves.

She wanted to touch his hair. She gripped his shoulder tighter. She felt his heartbeat pounding against her breast and wondered when it had started. Did it beat for her, or the swell of white hot chemical fire blooming toward them across the water? She hoped it beat for her. She pretended that it beat for her.

They kissed until they gasped for air and stopped to catch their breaths as they touched foreheads. She closed her eyes and breathed in his scent, memorizing it for her last seconds alive. When has she last held a man like this? Never, she thought. Never quite like this. A frisson trickled through her and she tried to soak in the feel of him deep into the red of her bones where it could never leave her.

Then Cassian said, “It missed us.”

She lifted her head, looking up at him.

He watched her carefully, a small smile hinted at the corner of his mouth. “Jyn, we survived.”

She looked across the lake — indeed, the flames burled through the forests near them, around half a mile away and a safe distance, the waters a trepidatious barrier against it, but the blinding light had been only that: A blinding light.

They lived.

Cassian trembled in her arms.

“Your injuries,” she whispered. They needed to find a ship and somewhere to stay, but one look down at his leg revealed the stain of blood from an open wound. It needed tending to before they head out into the jungle for a shelter that may not exist. “Come, let’s sit a moment. I want to take a look at your leg.” With her as support, Cassian slowly sat down on the shore, legs stretched out. Luckily, there was a tear in his pants, revealing the wound. They wouldn’t have to remove any clothing. Jyn took off her gloves, laying them beside Cassian, and went to the lake to cup water in her bare palms. It was slightly warmer than it ought to be. When she returned, she smiled at him softly. “I’m not sure if this will sting.”

“I’ve managed worse,” he said. “Go on.”

She poured it over him, and it must have stung at least a little bit, if his flinch meant anything.

She went back and forth from the lake to Cassian, cleaning off the wound, and lightly rubbed away dirt and dried blood from his skin. The cut was a lot smaller than it had first appeared. It looked worse than it did, the bleeding long stopped as the wound had clotted already. She tore off part of her shirt and wrapped it around his leg as a bandage. She looked him over for other injuries, beside the obvious broken bones, and didn’t like the look of how dirty his face was. She tore off a final piece of her shirt and took it to the bank, soaking it, and went back to Cassian.

She touched the cloth to his forehead, cleaning away dirt. He glanced at her and then flicked his gaze away. Slowly his natural coloring began to reemerge from beneath the dirt. She went back to the lake to clean the rag, watching as black grime swirled in the water. She returned to him, wiping from blood from his temple, cleaning the apples of his cheeks.

He settled a hand upon her wrist. “You know you don’t have to do this.”

She couldn’t meet his eye. “I know.” But she wanted to. She was so thankful to have him, the one person who never abandoned her, even at the end of all things. “But someone has to. Let’s get you clean, then we’ll find a ship, somewhere to stay for the night. We need to contact the Rebellion. After all, someone is surely listening.”

When he didn’t question her, she went back to the lake and cleaned the cloth again.

Once Cassian was cleaner and well-rested, they hoisted him up to a stand with her shoulder as support, and then embarked back into the thick of where the action had long died out for shelter.

***

Scarif was a ghost town, dead bodies strewn everywhere and seemingly not a single soul left alive. Though she knew it was impossible to be the only survivors, it surely felt like they were. They crept inside the first aircraft that they found and shut the landing bay doors immediately. Their ship couldn’t fly, but it had a radio. With both their expertise, they ought to be able to jimmy it into contacting the Rebellion.

Jyn grabbed random coats, uniforms, temp blankets, anything to make something soft enough for a bed. She found a sufficient supply as well as a medikit with bacta treatments that took the edge off of his broken leg, making it a milder injury than its former severe condition. She felt ashamed at what little she had brought him. Both had roughed it in conditions far more abysmal than this, but something had changed ever since he saved her from Krennic and they kissed by the lake. She almost wished they had died. She imagined dying to be easier than face whatever had grown between them.

Cassian groaned as he laid down, hand gingerly settling over his chest. “Don’t mind me. Comm the others.”

She looked him over a final time, a hollow pit in her belly. She didn’t want to leave him—for all she knew, he was the last person of important in her life still alive, and his health held a fragile existence in the balance. “You’re sure?”

He echoed an earlier thought. “I’ve seen worse than this and survived.” But he smiled lightly, the same smile he’d done in the elevator, and she left quickly, in part to get away from him, his kindness leaving her unsettled.

***

She made much headway with the comm. She couldn’t get into the Rebellion’s frequency, but she’d established a survivable connection and only needed Cassian’s help to secure the codes for the Rebellion. She continued working on it until the stars fell over the darkening sky. The ship grew cold, so cold that her hands shook as she attempted to achieve the right frequencies. Then it occurred to her: Cassian. If her hands shook, then his certainly did. And she wasn’t the one with the broken bones and a leg wound.

She bounded through the craft to the pallet on the floor, Cassian’s slow, consistent breathing a comfort to see.

He looked up at her. “Any luck?”

She shrugged. “About as much as I can do without you. How are you holding up?”

“About as much as I can do without you.”

She bit her lip, ducking her head. “Are you cold?”

“A little.”

“I’ll go look for more stuff to cover you with.”

Only soon she returned, empty handed. She knew there were other ways to stay warm, but she didn’t know how to say it. She opened up with the obvious. “I’m afraid I couldn’t find anything else.”

“What a pity.” Then, hesitantly, Cassian lifted the layers of coats and aluminum blankets over him. “It worked when I stayed on Hoth with my bunkmates.” Though his voice ended with an upward hilt, uncertain, questioning.

Jyn replied by laying down beside him, careful not to kick his boots. They shifted a little to accommodate his injuries. Jyn attempted to lay flat on her back, but her side kept poking out from beneath the covers. She turned onto her side, facing him. Cassian snickered.

“What?” she retorted.

“We’ll never stay warm like this. We need to get closer.”

“Closer?”

“Don’t tell me you’re shy.”

“I’m not shy.”

Cassian’s smirk was visible through the meager lighting. “I believe you, Jyn, I do.”

Offended, she scooted closer to him and laid her cheek over his shoulder, hand laid flat over his chest. “As I said,” she said, stomach tingling.

They lied quietly, mindful of his injuries as she got more comfortable. Before she had been a bit of a wooden log pressed against him, as she had come closer out of pride more than anything, but as she listened to his heartbeat beneath her ear and felt the crests of his breath, she drew nearer, seeking his warmth, yearning for it. He wrapped an arm around her shoulder and held her dearly, his fingers tangled in her hair and pet her lightly. For a second, she forgot who she was, who he was, the hurts of her past and the years of abandonment. She felt like a woman in want of the fine man whose arms held her, whose heart she listened to as it beat. She forgot their mission, their successes, and focused only on the concern for his well-being, his life. She had never concerned herself with another person like this. She never had cause or the peace to do so.

“I’m glad to be alive with you,” she said, eyeing the dark walls that surrounded them. “I hope to live in peace with you.”

“I don’t think people like me will ever live in peace.”

Her fingers bunched over his shirt. “Don’t say that. We must have hope. After today, can’t we live on hope?”

He said nothing, merely continued combing his fingers through her hair. After a time, he whispered, “I hope to live in peace with you, too. I don’t deserve it, but I want it.”

Her eyes grew pained with the prickling sensation of tears. She could not help it. After watching her father die, after missing him for over a decade, to hear such words moved her beyond her understanding. “We’ll make it out.” There were six hours until his next bacta treatment. By then, he could make it to the comm. He was better at finding signals than her, and he had the codes to connect with the Rebellion. They were going to survive; she had no choice but to believe it.

She fell asleep to the lulling of his fingertips over her hair, to the warmth of him surrounding her.


End file.
